AN: Sorry this took me so long to get out. I got busy packing up and moving back to school. Still have to unpack, but I thought I'd get this up first. Also sorry it's so short, but the next few chapters will be longer, so hopefully it makes up. Thanks to all who have reviewed so far. You guys are AWESOME:D Hope you like it.

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A Little More Tequila, A Little Less Demon Hunting

– – Chapter Four – –

Nightmares

The next week, Sam returned to daycare and Dean to fourth grade. The imprint of their father's hand was barely visible on Sam's face, but Dean's face was still darkly bruised. He explained to his teacher and any kids who asked him that he had been running in the kitchen when he had slipped on the tiled floor and crashed into the table. He wasn't entirely sure his teacher believed him, but she never brought it up again, so Dean assumed that things were okay. John went to Dean's teacher and Sam's daycare manager and explained that they had been gone for three weeks because their grandmother had been deathly ill, and they had been staying with her until she got better. Dean was allowed to catch up on the work he had missed, and when September rolled around, he was allowed to move on to fifth grade while Sam went to kindergarten.

Their father had been able to get a job and maintain it, though he continued to go out most nights and come home late in the morning. Sometimes he would go straight to his room. But other times, when things got really bad, he would take his anger out on Dean. Sometimes he would head straight for his eldest son, hitting him in his chest and arms and legs; places that could be easily hidden by long pants and long sleeves, which Dean always wore, even during the summer, because Dean didn't think there was ever a time when there wasn't at least one bruise on his body.

Usually, however, John would head toward Sam. He never again mentioned what he had said that night about Mary's death, but he continued to look at Sam with hate glowing in his eyes, and it made Dean sick to see the look of fear and sadness on his little brother's face when his dad came home at three in the morning, yelling and cursing and looking at Sam like he wanted nothing better than to beat him to death.

Whenever his father took a menacing, threatening step toward Sam, Dean was always there to stand in front of his brother. Sometimes he would stand there wordlessly, daring his father to hit him instead of Sam. Sometimes he would yell at his father, trying to make him angry enough to take his anger out on him instead. And sometimes, Dean would plead with his father to just leave Sam alone and hit him if he had to. He never fought with his father; never hit him. Only on the occasions when Dean couldn't keep his father away from Sam, when he was so tired and beaten that he couldn't stop his father from going after Sam and hitting him, punching him, and slapping him, causing his brother to cry out in pain, did Dean fight his father. He would fight him as hard as he could until he finally left Sam alone and moved back to him in his anger, beating him until his anger was spent and he slammed the door to his room behind him.

Dean didn't do well in school. His mind was always elsewhere, and he found it hard to concentrate. But Sam threw himself into school with vigor, and he excelled at everything he did. He absorbed knowledge like a sponge. Dean figured that it was Sam's way of coping; of trying to get his mind off of what was going on at home. Though Sam seemed happy to learn whatever he could, he didn't talk to any of the kids at school, and he didn't have any friends.

Then one day, when Dean was ten years old and Sam was six, their father came home horribly drunk; drunker than he'd been in awhile, and he lost all control and hit Dean hard in the face. When he went to school the next day, his eye was swollen shut, and his teacher was so upset that she called John to ask him if everything was okay at home. Then she said that she wanted him to come to school to meet with her.

That day, their father announced that they were moving.

It turned out to be the first of many moves to come.

They moved to a new town in a new state and a new piece of shit apartment with only one room, and Sam and Dean were once again forced to share a sofabed. Their father got a new job and Sam and Dean went to new schools. He still got drunk. Dean was still beaten. And Dean still managed to keep his father's rage focused on him and away from his little brother.

At least most of the time.

Then, rumors started to spread of trouble in the Winchester household. Small bruises on Dean's wrists. Limping. Refusal to change for gym class or to even participate. Dean's teacher asking too many questions.

They stayed there for only a few months before they moved on.

It was only the beginning. Questions always seemed to pop up, no matter how hard Dean tried to hide the fact that he was always bruised, always tired, always in pain. Teachers noticed things. They asked questions. They made phone calls. Principals called the house and wanted to arrange meetings with their father.

They moved many, many times over the years, never staying in one place for too long.

Then one particularly bad night, something happened that Dean had prayed would never happen. His father went after him…and Sam tried to fight him off. He threw himself at their father's back, screaming and yelling his eight-year-old lungs out, telling him to leave Dean alone and hitting him wherever his tiny fists could land. Before Dean could utter a sound, his father grabbed Sam off of his back, lifted him up by his arms, and Dean cringed as he heard a loud crunching noise followed by his brother's pain filled wails. Dean watched in horror as his father threw Sam clear across the room, where he crashed into a table, clutching his clearly broken arm close to him.

That night, their father took Sam to the hospital and told them that as soon as they let Sam out, they were moving again.

That day, as Sam lie on the hospital bed with a cast on his left arm and a few stitches on his cheek while their father was off signing papers, Dean told him, in the best "I'm the big brother and that means I'm the boss" voice he could manage around the tears he was fighting, to never, ever, get in their father's way again. Dean held back the tears as Sam began to cry, telling him that he didn't like watching his father hit him. He didn't like watching Dean get hurt. Didn't like standing around and feeling useless…and guilty.

Dean's sadness was replaced by anger. Anger at his father for doing this to them, anger at God for letting this happen to their family…for taking his mother away. Dean told Sam that it was not his fault and he should not feel guilty about it. He told him to blame their father or God or the world for what was happening to them, but to never, ever, blame himself. Because that's what Dad wanted. He blamed Sam and he wanted him to blame himself. Sam asked if Dean blamed him, and Dean wanted to cry, wanted to scream, wanted to throws things around the room because how dare his father let this happen to them? Dean pulled Sam close to him in a hug, and as Sam cried into his shoulder, Dean told Sam over and over and over again that he did not blame him, that he could never blame him, and that he should not blame himself…that he loved him more than anything in the world. Sam held him close with his good arm, and when the tears subsided and Dean asked him if he understood, Sam nodded his head and sniffled, and Dean smiled.

But Dean couldn't help the rants that soon escaped his mouth. Couldn't help blaming his father and God and the world for messing up their lives. Couldn't help wondering if God was even really out there when he hadn't answered any of the prayers he had shot up to him every night since his mother's death, asking him to get them out of this life and somewhere safe.

Then Sam had quietly told him to have faith. Dean turned to his brother, puzzled, and asked Sam how he could have faith after everything that had happened to them. And Sam said that when Dean taught him how to pray, he prayed every night, and that his prayers had always been answered because Dean was still alive and the two of them were still together. Dean's eyes filled with tears, and Sam told him that he had to have faith even when times were rough. He told him that he can have faith in God because he has faith in Dean, and Dean has never let him down.

Dean returned to Sam's side and held him close, letting a few stray tears fall on his baby brother's head, and he held him until their dad came back and told them that they were leaving.

Over the years to come, Sam obeyed Dean's wishes and didn't get in the way of his father. But he does so unhappily, and when his father finally left, Sam did his best to patch up his brother's cuts and soothe his brother's bruises with cold compresses and looks of caring and love and by just being there as his brother fells into fitful sleeps, his breathing harsh and unsteady. On those rare occasions when Dean couldn't help lying awake all night, crying from the pain in his chest that made it so hard to breath that he couldn't sleep, Sam lay awake with him, holding his hand or telling him the stories that Dean used to tell him.

Some nights, when Sam couldn't help the anger and helplessness he felt having to watch Dean get beaten for protecting him, wishing that just once Dean would stand aside and let Sam take the brunt of their father's anger, Dean reminded him of their plan. How, in a few short years, Dean would have a job and money and be old enough to find them a place to live and they would go far, far away and never have to come back.

And finally, Dean turned thirteen and was old enough to get a job. He worked delivering newspapers part time at first, still going to school, but his grades suffered even more. By then, they had settled into a decent apartment, and for the first time since their mother's death, Sam and Dean got a room and beds of their own. Sam continued to thrive in school, wishing that he could get a job like his brother, but he was still too young.

Dean worked his way up to working in a grocery store, and though he was only allowed to work outside of school hours, he dedicated all that time to working. He failed all his classes and would refuse to go all together if his father wasn't there to yell at him and beat him and tell him to get his ass to school and pull his grades up or they would be suspicious and Sam would be sorry.

So Dean tried his hardest to balance a job and his schoolwork. When he turned 15, he got a job at a car garage, working his way through simple cleaning jobs. He paid attention to everything that went on, and he made friends with a 23 year old named Michael, one of the younger mechanics who said that Dean reminded him a lot of himself. Michael taught him everything he knew when they weren't working, and soon Dean's love for cars grew. He was a fast learner, and when he turned sixteen he dropped out of school and got a full time job in the garage, continuing to learn and doing more and more difficult tasks.

At first, his father got angry that he dropped out of school, and he beat him horribly. But eventually, when Dean continued to refuse to go back, his father gave up and figured it was for the best because now there wouldn't be anymore nosy teachers and principals butting into their home life. He continued to beat Dean, and Dean continued to wear long sleeves and pants, but people just accepted this as part of his bad boy image. Dean just didn't do shorts or short sleeves, opting instead for long sleeves, jeans, and jackets.

While working in the garage, Dean did research into places that might allow an underage teen with a younger brother to rent an apartment. But it was hard work. Dean didn't want to find a place too close to where their father was, and finding out information about illegal apartment rental on the Internet or in newspapers was certainly not going to happen. But he kept an eye out just the same.

As much as Dean wanted to get himself and Sam out of their father's house as soon as possible, Dean was too afraid of raising his brother out on the street to just leave without having somewhere to go. His father had instilled in him a deep fear of life in the streets, with his constant threats to throw them out into a world that he claimed was "far less kind than he was." When they did something to anger their father, he would tell them horror stories about how hard and painful it was to live on the streets, alone and cold and hungry. Dean was afraid of trying to raise Sam in the unknown, and so he felt he had a better chance of protecting his brother if he didn't leave their father until they had someplace to go.

His father had also instilled in him a fear of authority figures, like teachers, but most especially police, due to his threatening to kill them, hurt them, or "make them wish they'd never been born" if they ever told anyone what he did. And Dean was not afraid to admit that he was scared to death of his father: of what he did to them…or what he could do to them.

So Dean continued to live with Sam under their father's roof, protecting him as best he could from the dangers that they knew, too afraid to face the unknown dangers that lurked outside their house.

Then one night, when Dean was seventeen and Sammy was still twelve, Sam asked Dean to tell him what happened to their mother. Sam said he'd been having weird dreams lately; dreams full of fire and blood and Mom screaming at someone to leave him alone and Dad sitting on the floor calling out for her. Sam seemed upset, lost in thoughts of the weird dreams he'd been having. The idea of Sam having dreams about that night freaked Dean out more than he would ever admit to Sam, because he described it as being so vivid, and it was so close to the tale that his Dad had told him. Dean was wary of telling him, but finally his brother gave him the look that he couldn't say no to, and Dean told him what his father had told him about their mother burning up over Sam's crib when he was six months old.

When Dean was done explaining, Sam asked him if he believed it, and Dean vehemently insisted that no, he didn't believe it. When Dean asked Sam the same, Sam shrugged and looked away quickly, and Dean was upset because he knew that Sam really did believe it and was just too afraid to tell him.

Dean hoped and prayed that the dreams would stop, because there was just no way they could be real, and yet Sam continued to believe that what he was seeing was real. Sam never told him he believed them, but he didn't have to. Dean knew his brother well enough.

For those next few months, Sam continued to have dreams almost nightly about their mother dying on the ceiling, and when Sam woke up panting in the middle of the night, Dean held him close and told him they were just dreams and that they weren't real. He held Sam until he finally fell asleep again.

For those next few months, neither of them slept that much. Dean's performance at work suffered, and his friend Michael, the first friend he'd ever had outside of his brother, asked him if something was wrong with him. When Dean insisted that nothing was wrong and his friend continued to push, Dean yelled at him to stay out of his business

For those next few months, Dean didn't talk to Michael, and Dean wondered if Sammy would ever have any friends.

Then one night, Sam turned thirteen, and everything fell apart.

TBC...